Terry Riley is a leading silk at the Sydney Bar. When he's murdered, half-way through a garden-variety personal injuries hearing, his junior counsel, Ben Kennedy, starts sleuthing. Ben's investigation threatens to rock the legal system and destroy some big reputations. A fast-paced Australian legal thriller with comic touches. Views: 25
Secrets, surprises, and at least one dead body come out of the closet in the Palm Beach P.I.'s most twisted case yet. When self-styled impresario and former human cannonball Matthew Hayes rents a luxury villa on Palm Beach's famed South Ocean Boulevard, the locals roll their eyes. But when he scuttles the traditional backyard accoutrements of swimming pool and tennis court in favor of a grand garden hedge maze modeled after the one at Hampton Court, the South Florida smart set can't wait for their invitations -- to the gala opening of the Amazin' Maze of Matthew Hayes. The big night arrives and gasps of wonder and delight are replaced by those of horror, as Hayes's ladylove is discovered at the center of the maze, very dead indeed. The authorities are stumped, as Hayes's carnival background gives rise to a number of possible suspects. Or are there other forces -- and more devious minds -- at work? Hayes's flair for the dramatic only complicates a mystery that has more false leads than his Amazin' Maze. It's up to Archy McNally to see through the scam and catch a killer.From Publishers WeeklyThis wacky, waggish whodunit is the sixth McNally title under the able authorship of novelist Lardo (The Hampton Affair), who took up the reins from the late Lawrence Sanders with 1999's McNally's Dilemma. When Archy is invited to attend the gala unveiling of an English hedge maze at the Palm Beach home of Amazin' Matthew Hayes—an ex-human cannonball turned carnival impresario (5'4" in heels) married to Marvelous Marlena Marvel, a bosomy sideshow hootchy-cootchy (6'2" in socks)—our hero is flabbergasted to find Marlena dead at the center of the maze. The boorish Hayes hires Archy to investigate his wife's bizarre murder; Archy is also employed by his attorney father, who has recently been consulted by one of the guests at the unveiling about the matter of a contested will. Black-sheep Laddy Taylor is hoping to relieve Carolyn, his 40-something, widowed stepmother, of his father's loot. With a gay gossip columnist, a young bisexual fortune-hunter, a fast-food heiress and her philandering hubby, an ex-caddy turned TV reporter, a husband/wife TV talk show team, and the sexy housemaid heading a list of suspects as colorful as the boutiques along Worth Avenue, snide, irrepressible Archy sets to work unraveling this baffling case. Red herrings proliferate, and legions of adoring McNally faithful will be left shouting, "Bravo! Encore!" Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. From BooklistSanders originated the Archy McNally novels, and Sanders' publisher and estate have allowed Lardo to continue the series. This new one involves the death of a woman in a garden-hedge maze in a Palm Beach villa. The dead woman's husband, a self-styled impresario and former human cannonball, hires McNally to find his wife's killer. Lardo populates the novel with colorful characters, including Georgia O'Hara, a green-eyed, blond state trooper who is short on the domestic arts and long on sex appeal; her landlady, "an ancient recluse who came of age during the last big conflict and saw a German spy behind every palm tree"; and McNally's father, whose martinis "are as dry as a rain forest in August." What will keep readers engrossed are Lardo's descriptive passages. For example, when McNally enters a bar, "the pianist, in black tie, was tinkling out a Cole Porter melody that, like all Porter tunes, was conducive to ordering an old fashioned while gazing into the eyes of a beautiful woman." As far as the plot is concerned, the question is, Has Archy McNally ever failed to catch the killer? Even if readers know the answer, they will follow the book through to the end. George CohenCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved Views: 25
A romantic comedy written by a former flight attendant and number one bestseller! 'Welcome on board, Ladies and Gentlemen! Mingling with rich and famous forst class passengers is all in a day's work for Katie. But when she meets a gorgeous, eligible TV star on board a transatlantic flight from New York to Dublin, her whole word is turned upside down. Adam is everything a woman could want and more. But why is he insisting on keeping their relationship a secret? And is really a member of THAT club?'Very Funny' - Evening Herald.'A wonderful, witty writer' - Daily Record.'Great beach read' - Ok! Views: 25
His name is Rafaele Vestri, Rafe to his friends.He’s tall, strong, handsome. Distant. He often comes to the café where I work, but we don’t talk much. He looks at me, though. Stares at me, his gaze heated, and I can’t help but stare back. I want him, I won’t deny it. I’ve never seen anyone that beautiful, anyone that powerful, in my life.But he’s growing more withdrawn by the day. Something’s up, and he won’t tell. I know about his past – the murder of his family when he was fifteen. I can imagine what it must have cost him. So much violence contained in that strong body, waiting to be unleashed. What is he seeking? What is he training so hard for? Why is looking at me like he’s dying to touch me, but won’t dare?Even as I try to stop thinking about him, get interested in other boys, I realize I can’t. I’m caught, body and soul, just like that. And I tell myself, Megan, girl… What have you gotten yourself into this time? Views: 25
A gripping and definitive portrait of the man who headed one of the most enigmatic and terrifying regimes of modern times In the three and a half years of Pol Pot's rule, more than a million Cambodians, a fifth of the country's population, were executed or died from hunger. An idealistic and reclusive figure, Pol Pot sought to instill in his people values of moral purity and self-abnegation through a revolution of radical egalitarianism. In the process his country descended into madness, becoming a concentration camp of the mind, a slave state in which obedience was enforced on the killing fields.How did a utopian dream of shared prosperity mutate into one of the worst nightmares humanity has ever known? To understand this almost inconceivable mystery, Philip Short explores Pol Pot's life from his early years to his death. Short spent four years traveling throughout Cambodia interviewing the surviving leaders of the Khmer Rouge movement, many of whom... Views: 25
The protagonist of this Explorer Corps adventure is Ugly Screaming Stink-Girl. The name is supposed to bring her luck, but since she is quickly contaminated by a red fungus known as the Balrog, one has to wonder. Then she, Admiral Festina Ramos, and a slightly mad fellow named Tut are assigned to a rescue mission on the planet Muta. There, an entire expedition from the unit has been turned into gas clouds that give out electromagnetic pulses, and it looks as if this is the result of a deadly defense mechanism left behind by an alien race. It takes ingenuity and suffering to discover the mystery behind the pulses. The sheer complexity of Gardner’s characters and inventions will make the book daunting to a good many, but his ingenuity and wit will keep a good many others reading voraciously. Views: 25
With more than 120 titles still in print, Louis L'Amour is recognized the world over as one of the most prolific and popular American authors in history. Though he met with phenomenal success in every genre he tried, the form that put him on the map was the short story. Now this great writer -- who The Wall Street Journal recently compared with Jack London and Robert Louis Stevenson -- will receive his due as a great storyteller. This volume kicks off a series that will, when complete, anthologize all of L'Amour's short fiction, volume by handsome volume.Here, in Volume Two, is a treasure-trove of 35 frontier tales for his millions of fans and for those who have yet to discover L'Amour's thrilling prose -- and his vital role in capturing the spirit of the Old West for generations to come.From the Hardcover edition. Views: 25
Alexa's dream job becomes a threat to her life... When famous pop star Colin Radcliffe asks Alexa to write his biography and tour with him in Europe, she's thrilled. It all seems like a fairy tale come true—until she begins to receive death threats. To her dismay, Colin puts her under the 24/7 protection of his chief bodyguard, Jamison Constanzo—a man with whom she’s clashed from day one... Views: 25
A gripping cold weather, true-life adventure, Heart So Hungry tells the story of a race across Labrador and one woman's determination -- inspired by grief and fed by outrage -- to set the record straight.A remarkable adventure, a love story and a thrilling race are all front and centre in this account of how one woman's devotion to her late husband's memory transformed Mina Hubbard from a rural Ontario nurse into the most celebrated female explorer of her time.In 1903, following an ambitious expedition to map the interior of Labrador, Mina's husband, Leonidas, dies of starvation in a cold, boggy, wind-scoured landscape. Allegations surface that the expedition failed because of Hubbard's incompetence, so Dillon Wallace, Leonidas' partner on the failed expedition, decides to honour a promise that he made to Hubbard to complete the route that they had been supposed to take. When Mina Hubbard discovers what Wallace has planned, she doubts his motives and... Views: 25
